You can now buy your RER B train tickets, Métro and city bus tickets, in English, on either of two smartphone apps: Bonjour RATP and ÎDF Mobilités. This is the easiest way to buy: no waiting in line for a ticket agent or a ticket machine, no having to change money or have correct coins.
Download the app—start with Bonjour RATP, it's the easiest. Do this, and set up your account before leaving home to make arrival faster and easier. Set up a credit/debit card payment method, touch Tickets and select On my Phone (which is where you want your ticket to be), then Buy on my Phone.
On the next screen, select Tickets for occasional trips, then Paris-CDG Airport Ticket (€11.80) and Buy.
Your ticket should be recorded on the Fares page on your phone.
To board the train, just touch your phone to the target on the turnstile to enter the station.
Remember that you will have to touch your phone again at a turnstile at the end of your trip to exit the arrival station!
From anywhere in the airport, follow signs reading Transports (Ground Transport), RER Trains, Train Station, or Paris par train (Paris by Train). You will end up at Aérogare 2 (Train Station 2), CDG Airport's main SNCF and RER train station.
If you have not already bought your ticket into Paris on the Bonjour RATP smartphone app, you can purchase it with euro coins and bills/notes, or with an accepted debit or credit card at the train station.
You may wait in line at the ticket office, or you may buy your ticket from a ticket machine. You cannot buy a ticket on the train. You must have a ticket to access the train station and to exit the station at your destination.
Buying RER B tickets at Aérogare 2.
There's usually a human or two to help if you have problems.
Enter the ticket office marked:
BILLETS PARIS/ÎLE DE FRANCE
TICKETS PARIS/ SUBURBS
BILLETES PARIS/CERCANIAS
(See the photo on the right—>).
(Do not enter the office marked "TGV - Billets Grandes Lignes - Mainlines Tickets - Billetes Grande Líneas." That office is for TGV intercity train tickets, not tickets to Paris.)
Wait in line and, if you're not going to buy a Navigo transit pass, ask for a ticket to Paris (un billet á Paris). The ticket agent will sell you a one-way/single ticket or round-trip/return ticket good for the RER Line B train all the way to central Paris. T
If you have sufficient euro coins, and/or bills/notes, or an accepted debit/credit card or a smartphone payment app (Apple Pay, Google Pay, etc.), you can buy your ticket from a ticket machine (see photo to right—>).
The machines offer instructions in various languages, including English.
Check the instructions to assure the machine will accept the sort of payment you intend to provide.
If you don't have euros nor a "smart" credit/debit card, find a distributeur de billets (ATM/cash machine) and use your home bank card to withdraw some euro notes. There are several near the ticketing machines and one on Level 4 of Aérogare 2 at the bank branch. If this doesn't work, find an airport Bureau de Change (currency exchange office) and change some cash to euros.
In Aérogare 2, look for signs reading vers Paris (To Paris), RER B, and voies 11 & 12 (tracks 11 & 12). Follow the signs to the turnstiles. Here's the route you'll take (map).
All trains from tracks 11 & 12 go to central Paris.
On the RER system, you must touch your phone or transit pass, or insert your ticket into the turnstile, both to enter and to EXIT the system!
With a paper ticket, insert your ticket, then take it from the pop-up slot atop the turnstile and keep it with you.
At the end of your train journey, insert it into the turnstile to exit the RER system.
(This is different from the Paris Métro system, in which you need a ticket only to enter the Métro, not to exit it.)
Pass through the turnstile and descend to tracks 11 & 12.
All trains from tracks 11 & 12 go to central Paris! But some trains are faster than others. Here's how to choose a fast train for the ride into Paris, here are more tips on riding the RER trains, and here's an important warning about taking the RER B train back from central Paris to CDG Airport. More.
Your destination is probably one of the five RER Line B stations in central Paris: Gare du Nord, Châtelet Les Halles, St-Michel Notre Dame, Luxembourg or Denfert Rochereau. (You can get to Aéroport d'Orly from the RER B Denfert Rochereau or Antony stations. More. )
Some Navigo transit passes are valid for unlimited travel anywhere in the Île-de-France (Paris region), including between Aéroport Charles de Gaulle and central Paris. It may make sense for you to purchase a Navigo pass on the Bonjour RATP app and use it to travel into Paris. More.
